Whether it’s having a relaxing breakfast with his peers a few hours before show time, or enjoying the Monster Jam fans at the Built Ford Tough Party in the Pits, or even spending extra time with his youngest fans after events in the hotel lobby, Team Grave Digger driver Charlie Pauken is one of the nicest, most mild mannered gentlemen you’ll meet anywhere. But that away from the track persona is the polar opposite of the personality that straps inside his Black and Green Wrecking Machine and delivers some of the biggest thrills in the sport today, because as any competitor who has battled this Monster Jam superstar knows, especially in a freestyle competition, when the belts are tightened, the helmet is on, and the lights go green, Charlie Pauken is all of a sudden known simply as Chucky. And when Chucky is in the house, it’s Game On!
So is Pauken aware of just how different his off track reputation contrasts with his popular on track performances? Does he realize at what exact moment he goes from Charlie to Chucky? After giving me a hearty laugh thinking about that, Pauken answered: “Yeah, yeah. That has always been my big thing. I don’t know, I always had to be different when I was a kid. And that just followed suit. When I get in the truck I can express myself from inside the truck. Normally I’m a nice, quiet kind of guy, laid back, I don’t say much. Then you put me in the truck and I take on a whole different perspective. My alter ego, I call it.”
That alter ego has thrilled fans all over the world from his Grave Digger classics, to almost winning a world title in Monster Mutt, to dominating the freestyle competitions on this year’s Monster Jam World Tour. The native of Maumee, OH, has been able to take those amazing on track performances to the point where he is considered among the sport’s elite; many would say that he is among the best three or four freestyle performers in the sport today.
For Pauken the climb to the top has been a long one, his debut in the sport going back some two decades. “That was Excalibur”, Pauken recalled when asked about his first time behind a monster wheel. “ I started with Mike Nichol and Dave Marquart. I had been going on the road with them, crewing for them, helping out. Then one day Dave drove at a show in Indiana, at a TNT race, it was a big track. Dave went out there and put down a good run and I remember the tailgate flew off. Then the next day he comes out and he goes ‘I’m not gonna drive today’. He goes ‘you’re driving today.’ He said ‘if I go out there and try to race all of these guys again I’m just going to roll this thing over, and it’s not worth it.’ So you’re going to drive today.’ And I’m like (pause) ‘O-K’. So I barely stomached breakfast and went out and drove. I didn’t do great. I thought I was doing this great stuff and then I’d go back and watch it on video and think it’s not that great. Really the video is the big thing, I think, going back and watching the video. You see what you are doing and you can get a real idea of what the truck is doing from the outside compared to what it feels like inside the truck.”
Those of us who had the pleasure of seeing Pauken in action during the Excalibur days always have considered him a natural talent, and he agrees that Monster Jam has been a great fit for him from day one as a driver. “Actually it did feel comfortable right from the start’” Pauken confirmed.” I was always driving mini bikes, go karts, always driving something motorized, and I had watched the truck enough and I had seen their throttle rhythm; when to gas it, when to let out, when to hit the brakes. So I had seen enough, I kind of had an idea how the truck would respond. So it did feel pretty natural. And the guys were confident in me and had me do a few more shows and the next thing I know they’re saying ‘there’s a show in New York so take the rig and go do it."
From there Pauken began truly making a name for himself. “I ran Excalibur with Mike and Dave for seven years. At that time I decided I wanted something different and ended up buying a second Excalibur truck with Tim Bush,” Pauken continued. “So we bought it, and he was kind of the silent partner with it. He did most of the stuff like trying to get sponsors. I’m not into that. I can drive. I know that I can drive. That was my part of it. So we ran another four years and at that time I started to get burned out from being on the road so I decided to step back and see where this was all going.”
But he would not step back for long. Dennis Anderson’s Grave Digger operation was exploding in popularity and the demand for Grave Digger was so high that the team began expanding, adding trucks. But that also brought a dilemma. Not just anybody can drive a Digger. The searches continued, looking for just the right type of talent that could handle the Grave Digger pressure and deliver for the sport’s biggest fan base night in and night out. Dennis and his team had no intention of seeing Charlie Pauken, a natural fit for a Grave Digger truck, sitting on the sidelines. Quickly Charlie Pauken was back in action, now wearing black and green.
Talk about a perfect fit for each. Team Grave Digger gets a driver ideally suited for it, and Pauken has the type of opportunity that he can relish and flourish with. Charlie Pauken has been driving a Grave Digger for 10 years now, and loves it even more today than he did at the start. “It does work out really well for me,” Pauken confided. “It has taken a lot of pressure off me, having to worry about getting the hauler down the road and blowing up motors and so on. I mean when it comes out of your back pocket you’re nickel and diming everything. I mean I was doing stuff like taking the used motor oil and using in the planetaries, because it was still pretty good oil. We can throw that in the planetary and run that stuff. We ran a really efficient operation as much as we could (in Excalibur) and I had a great time doing it. I had a great time working with Aaron Polburn doing Thunder Nationals. I was pretty much the king there. You couldn’t touch me on a Thunder Nationals course.”
Pauken admits that it did take a while for him to get comfortable driving a truck that someone else had made famous. “The first few years I had people yelling down from the stands ‘Hey Dennis, hey Dennis’. It’s like you’ve kind of got to swallow your pride,” Charlie admitted. “So you still have to go out there and make a name for yourself, and that’s hard to do in a Grave Digger truck when Dennis has done so much with it already. I mean I give him the credit for it. It’s great what he’s done. I guess I’m just glad that I’m one of the drivers of a Grave Digger because it fits me driving-wise. And for me to be able to go on the road now weekend to weekend and to at least be able to go home during the week and have somewhat of a sane life at home it’s a good opportunity for me, it has worked out well for the last ten years. The past ten years have flown by. I mean, now I have almost driven a Digger as long as I drove Excalibur. Like I said, it’s just flown by.”
Pauken said it really didn’t take him that long to get used to now being a part of the team Anderson created and he loves it, but he also quickly points out that he really enjoys the other opportunities that have come his way, thanks in part to the popularity he has built for himself while being on the Grave Digger team. Not only has he enjoyed the new opportunities, he has added to his own stature and popularity in other trucks as well, most notably becoming a legitimate World Championship contender driving Monster Mutt the past few years in Las Vegas at the NGK Spark Plugs World Finals. “It’s easier for me to go out and drive Monster Mutt in Las Vegas, or when I debuted Taz, it’s actually easier for me to do that because you don’t have the added pressure of going last and to try and knock down what everybody else has already put out there,” Pauken explained. “So with that it’s fun to go out there and go ‘alright guys, here we go, see if you can follow suit on this one.’ Because you know I’ve got my little tricks up my sleeve that I like to throw out there, so that’s what is cool about it. There are still those little tricks that you can throw out to try and beat the guys that follow.”
That combination of thrilling fans driving Grave Digger in arenas and stadiums worldwide for a decade and stepping up big time at the sport’s biggest night in Sam Boyd Stadium driving the Mutt has continued to build Pauken’s reputation as one of the sport’s elite with the fans. He has been one of the most popular and respected drivers in the sport among his peers even longer. “It is satisfying. It’s odd though, because I don’t see myself as that good,” Pauken responded to my question about the respect he has earned in the pits from drivers and crewmembers alike. “I’m just Charlie Pauken. I come out here and I drive hard and then I still go home and work a regular job. I mean, I still mow my Aunt’s lawn. I’ve mowed my Aunt’s lawn since I was 19. One of the neighbors pinned her down one day and said ‘is that Charlie Pauken mowing your lawn?’ And she’s like ‘yeah, that’s my nephew.’ And he’s just flabbergasted by it. So it’s funny in that aspect. I’m just a normal guy.”
Being one of a select group of drivers who developed this sport in the early days and are still a part of riding the wave of today’s Monster Jam popularity, Pauken told me he sometimes has a hard time believing just how popular and amazing this sport has become: “I can’t. I really can’t. I never thought it would get this big, to where we’d be going overseas. Like I said, I was at the point where I wanted to sell out and just see where the sport was going, because I was kind of unsure back then exactly what was going to happen with the sport. A lot of things were changing. It’s obvious now that it’s here to stay. It’s so main stream it’s ridiculous. When you see it on regular TV programs, and all the Monster Jam programs, you know that you’ve done something with it.”
While he still plans to be in the driver’s seat for several more years, the veteran has a great appreciation for the new talent entering the sport that will carry it into the future, and he has a special fondness for the sport’s current World Freestyle Champion, 22 year old Adam Anderson, who engaged Pauken in a man to man series of riveting duels in Europe this year that had the fans standing and cheering. “I always love to see Adam drive. Adam’s a chip off the ol’ block,” Pauken said in discussing his good friend’s son. “Great kid. Great personality. Level headed. Just a great kid to be around. And then to watch him drive, it definitely pushes me because he puts it all out there. I’m like ‘dang it, you’re gonna make me go out there and have to really work.’ You know I’m getting older and I’m feeling it more and more, so battling these young guys, shoot, I ‘m just hoping to get another five years out of this gig.”
Speaking of getting older, Pauken says he could not still be competing today if not for all of the new technology that has been developed to protect today’s Monster Jam drivers.“ No, no,” was Charlie’s answer when I asked if he would still be in action without all of these new safety features. “Like the Hans Device. I picked that up about five years ago. I have had problems with my lower back and with my neck driving these trucks for years. I mean we were driving old leaf spring trucks and back in the day you were really taking some hits. We’re taking harder hits now but we’ve got so much better safety equipment. I won’t drive without the Hans Device. We’re getting the seats so much better. We’re tied down in the truck now, you’re not moving around as much. I think that’s a big key to it. A lot of the younger guys say they don’t get hurt , or at least aren’t hurting as much. You know I get done with my run and I’m kind of feeling it a little and I ask Frank (Krmel) and he’s saying ‘oh I’m fine.’ So I’m like, ‘ah, just shut up!’
But don’t let that fool you. He may feel the big jumps a little more than the young guns, but Charlie Pauken isn’t backing down one little bit. He’s spent some 20 plus years helping to build Monster Jam into what it is today, and he’s still got plenty left in the tank. If you don’t believe me, just ask the other drivers. They will tell you that to beat Charlie Pauken you have to take your game to its highest level, and if you can top this Monster Jam legend, then you have a memorable, special victory. It’s a rare level of respect from his fellow competitors that Pauken not only deserves, but that he continues to earn every night that the helmet goes on and Charlie becomes Chucky.
